Alabama

Last night my daughter and I sat down to share a pizza and before we ate I thanked God that I was eating ‘take out’ food because I wanted to, not because I didn’t have a stove to cook on.  I was grateful for a couch to sit on in a room that had all four walls intact and that in my front yard there was grass and not an uprooted tree or two or three.

I have just returned from Alabama where I had the privilege to spend 4 days helping clear debris from the tornado that ripped through Tuscaloosa a few weeks ago. I have pictures, but they don’t adequately portray the miles and miles of devastation or give you a feel for the work that is being done hourly to clear roads, parking lots and subdivisions of uprooted trees, pieces of siding, road signs, furniture, damaged cars, clothing, dishes and a host of other items.  It was definitely an experience I won’t soon forget and I was only there a few days. I got to come home to order and cleanliness.

All through the city organizations have stations set up for distribution of food, clothing, necessities and for storm victims to register for help in cleaning their yards.  Families and neighbors are working together to make things as livable as possible and strangers, like us, came from out of town – even out of state – to help.  The area is a disaster for sure and most of the people need help from others in one way or another.   It is a true blessing to have been a small part in helping several families.

Although the damage in Alabama was caused by a storm, sometimes we have disasters in our lives.  Sometimes they are from circumstances completely beyond our control, like a tornado, and sometimes we cause them by our attitude, actions or choices we make.  As with natural disasters, life-disasters affect more people than we can imagine.  Usually the damage covers more territory than we would have expected and causes casualties in areas we had not calculated.  Unlike a tornado, which is not affected by its own forceful winds, a life-disaster affects the one acting as well as those in its path.  Also unlike most natural disasters, the major damage from a life-disaster may not be felt until long after the storm has whipped through.

One thing is for sure – just like the folks in Alabama will not recover from this devastation on their own, neither do those who are experiencing a life-disaster.  Family, friends and even strangers are important if we want to contain a storm or heal from the affects of its already unleashed winds.  In a life-disaster the best tools for helping are not chain saws, rakes and machinery but prayer, love, honesty and the Word of God.

Life disasters come in many forms; death, failure, financial collapse, failing health, rejection, divorce, bankruptcy; you can fill in your own blank with where you are or have been.  Pulling out of these situations and regaining stable, healthy ground is usually only accomplished when others are by our side.  I know that has been true for me.  Without the love and care of friends and family my life and my thoughts would be so different than they are right now.  Continual prayers have been my saving grace, my lifeline, or perhaps you could say the bulldozer that moved the rubbish so I could see the good that was left.

Maybe someone you know is causing tornado winds in the lives of others – they need your prayers.  Perhaps your friend has the rubbish from a tornado piling all around them – they need your prayers.  We need to be the prayer-bulldozer that stops the wind and clears the debris.  Prayer is important because just like my pictures of Tuscaloosa can’t tell the whole story adequately, only God knows the whole story of a life-disaster.

Someday Tuscaloosa will once again be a thriving city and evidence of the total devastation they are now experiencing will be almost completely gone.  Prayer can do the same in the lives of those we love.  Pray the Word.  Speak with honesty.  Pray that God’s love will win in the end.  After all, it’s the individuals in the city God cares about; it’s them He wants to rebuild.  It’s an honor to be part of that with our hands and feet or our prayers.

The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t. If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.    I Corinthians 12:25-26